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Libraries Are For Everyone: An Epic Correction

Yesterday Robbie McDuff commented on my original Libraries Are For Everyone post where he kindly requested that I make some Eastern Hemisphere globes on what I call the epicsigns(the one with the ten people holding globes). I have to ashamedly admit that I had thought of it when people started responding to my images, but then let the lazy side of me win. Robbie made me step back and realize that I really should take the time to correct the North American-centric globes.

Robbie: thank you so much for gently calling me out on this!

So I rolled up my Photoshop sleeves and spent over five hours this morning creating more vantage points on the globe and then inserting them into the epic signs. I’ll share all of the updated previous-posted versions here, and then add a link from the originals over to this post. And from this point forward, all of my signs will use what I’m calling my truly epicversion of these signs.

Enjoy!

Arabic

Czech

English

French

Japanese school libraries

Japanese public/city libraries

Gender-inclusive Spanish

Russian

Spanish

UPDATE: The fantastic Katy reached out to me and made me realize that I should also mix up the globes in the “three person” images. So, starting with the Hmong, you’ll notice this change. After I get through this first wave of translations, I’ll sneakily replace the former images with the different globs. Well, it won’t be that sneaky since I’m telling y’all. Oh well, that’s how I roll.

A NOTE: I am slowly working on getting my artwork uploaded onto the Wikimedia Commons for people to find it easier all the while making all of it “officially” licensed. That said – my entire blog here is under a Creative Commons Attribute/Share Alike license – so know that I both want and encourage everyone to download, share, modify, and have fun with my work!

I also want to reiterate what I’ve stated in the past since I can’t make it an exception within the license: I do not want my name (given or business) on my minimalist art. It sort of ruins the clean lines and elegance. Just don’t tell people that you’re the creator – I’m fine with you crediting it to “an awesome Punk Rock Book Jockey blogger” if you can’t recall either of my names. Or write by Hafuboti on the back in pencil if you’re worried about it. Seriously. Have fun.

I plan on putting this note on the bottom of all of my Libraries Are For Everyone posts so if you’ve read the above paragraph once, then you won’t need to again (unless you really want to).

That’s more than fine!!! You should be able to show them the CC license on the side of my blog (or my note at the bottom of this post) and they should make it work. If not, then shoot me an email and I’ll write out a permission letter. :)

Thank you SO MUCH–I’m a retired English teacher and just sent this to everyone I know, especially librarians. This is the most positive, strong, important statement I’ve seen since the election–I can’t even imagine the time you have spent on this project! You really are a “superhero” librarian :-)

We love these and want to display some in our college library! Our Dean wants “to vet” the translations on the ones we want to display. Would you please tell me who translated the English to Arabic and English to Spanish for you? And any credentials you could offer would be great. Thank you for such a wonderfully beautiful and inclusive creation.

I’ll see if I can find another native speaker to verify or submit a correction. These signs have been around for about 9 months and this is the first I’m hearing that it’s not right so it may be a situation where the phrasing may be different than “libraries are for everyone.”